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Enchantments
An “enchantment” is considered to be a spell that uses the magic of the caster to temporarily imbue an item with energy that gives it an unnatural effect upon itself, others, or its surroundings. Due to the laws of magic, which state that unique forms of magic cannot, will not, and should not be mixed together, you can only have one enchantment on an item at any given time. Wards are considered to be enchantments, but not all enchantments are wards. Wear and Tear All enchantments will wear off over time as the magic returns to the soul of the caster, bringing the energy fueling the effect with it. Since the magic will be slowly returning back to the soul of the caster, the enchantment will fade over time and need to be re-cast on a consistent basis. Note that, if you use your magic to perform an action, then the results of the action will still be there when your magic returns to you. For example, if you enchanted knitting needles to knit scarves for you, the needles would start to stop knitting once your magic began to return to your soul, but you'd still have the scarves they did make before stopping. How often an enchantment needs to be replaced depends on how far the magic would need to travel to return to their soul of origin. Energy has to travel over space, the same as anything else, and magic will begin to return to their soul earlier if they sense it is further away, just as you might leave home earlier if you have to travel further than usual to get to work. Therefore, the farther away the caster is from the enchantment, the faster the enchantment will wear off. As a result, it’s good practice to have your local source of enchantments and wards travel with you or live nearby. Locations with magical defenses will have mages on staff specifically for their regular upkeep. In addition, enchantments (including wards) will react to magical collisions. This will cause some minor concussive damage to the enchanted person or object, and will cause some of the enchantment to shear off as it attempts to avoid the other magic. This magic will immediately return to their soul of origin, requiring enchantments under constant magical stress to be re-cast with more frequency. Common Enchantments Wards Wards are arguably the most common form of enchantment, to the point where there is a whole separate field of magical study within the Mages' Guild to study them separate from enchantments. Wards are enchantments specifically intended to counter the effects of someone else’s magic. This includes spells that protect or hide the target from magical forces, but NOT spells that protect or hide the target from physical forces. Signal Objects Items can be enchanted to send a specific message to a familiar when activated. The most common items used for this are jewelry, but it could technically be anything. They are normally enchanted by mages with a focus that allows them to communicate with animals, though mages with other focuses can often do something similar. Usually, these items are enchanted with a message that “summons” the familiar. While this doesn’t actually cause the animal to appear out of thin air, they will make a beeline towards you the second they hear the magical call. Kinda like whistling for your horse in video games, but without any range limitations. Alternatively, they could be enchanted to say whatever you want, from “I love you” to “Help” or anything you can think of. It's impossible to use this enchantment to communicate with a being with a soul, due to the individual magic within a soul repelling the magical message from the enchantment. Size Expansion One of the most useful enchantments that’s in high demand is a “bigger-on-the-inside” enchantment. As the description implies, this enchantment gives the target more internal space without changing the original size or weight of the container. Unsurprisingly, this enchantment is insanely useful, especially to messengers. However, like any enchantment, it has its limits. Most notably, the greater the effect that the enchantment has, the faster it will wear off. This means that increasing the size of building interiors or creating room-sized spaces within small objects is extremely ill-advised. Anything within the space when the enchantment wears off will react… well, about how you’d expect. Best case scenario, your belongings are strewn everywhere and the container looks like a popped balloon. Worst case scenario… well, let’s just hope no one was inside. For this reason, spaces made to contain living things (carts, buildings, cages, etc.) are rarely enchanted to be more than 25% larger than their original size. At most, a small amount of space is added to make the occupants more comfortable. Owners of such spaces are advised to never overfill the space with cargo or furniture. That way, if the enchantment wears off unexpectedly, the occupants will only find themselves somewhat uncomfortably squished. This is also less likely to happen, as less dramatic size changes will take far longer to wear off. Shapeshifting See More: Shapeshifting Magic Clothing Dye Despite the wide availability of plant-based dyes in Duil fashion norms, many people choose to add colors or decorations to their attire with magic. Like all enchantments, it would wear off eventually, so this is most commonly used for important events, rather than everyday style. Category:Magic